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Independent Media
Independent media as a source of social activism relies on artists and propagandists to be the media. This tactic involves appropriating structures of media in order to attack their traditional aims, or report on events that such mediums ignore. The following collective efforts demonstrate (mostly) local efforts at truly independent media. Youth Radio Oakland Youth radio encourages kids 14-24, most of which not being very well off, to get involved in grassroots media. Their programs and services include "professional development, media education, technical training, academic support and health services" and are all free of charge. They aim to "strengthen life-skills, motivate high school graduation, support higher education goals and prepare participants for thumb|300px|right careers in the 21st century." Starting out with a two minute spot on KQED seventeen years ago, this year, kids at Youth Radio will produce "more than 200 Youth Radio reports and commentaries that will be broadcast on National Public Radio programs such as All Things Considered and Morning Edition, on local public radio stations across the country and on-line outlets such as the Huffington Post, CNN.com and iTunes. While being above ground and sort of mainstream, youth radio shares with other media activist organizations the ideal that one can be the media, and can take control of the information that gets broadcast. Poor News Network PNN, "all the news that doesn't fit" is a multi-media access project, "dedicated to reframing the news, issues and solutions from low and no income communities." Like our other media activism peops, these folks try to open up the news machine for people that don't get represented and stuff. They produce local news articles in a way not unlike indymedia, though PNN tend to report more on things effecting people of color and poor neighborhoods. They write papers that effect the individual person, such as Giving a Sister a Break: Apples' Classist policies. http://www.poormagazine.com/ Neighborhood Public Radio Neighborhood public radio other NPR heh heh is a volunteer-run, mobile, seemingly spontaneous pirate radio station based in oakland. While they didn't start out as a mockery of National Public Radio, they do make fun of their acronym twin. One of the artists "once edited 24 hours' worth of NPR thanking its sponsors" and it ended up being 12 minutes with the most time going to burger king. This NPR is an ongoing social project that challenges media allocation and privilege. Their main thing is being a performance, the radio transmission frequency being quite low. They haven't been cited by the FCC because they are officially an internet radio show that "someone" might broadcast onto the airwaves, much like the stationary stations Berkeley Liberation Radio and Free Radio Santa Cruz. They even hosted a workshop on building pirate television transmitters! an article on them: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/12/28/DD63U0PKS... Paper Tiger Television thumb|300px|right Paper Tiger Television is a video production collective founded by volunteers in 1981. Coming from the Reagan era, these artists, activists, and more were "ready to tear into the dominant culture." Trying to seize control of the television medium, these Paper Tiger "was built on the distribution network provided by public access television," a re-imagination of television won by media activists in the 1970s. They aim "to challenge and expose corporate control of mainstream media through production and distribution of public access series, media literacy/video production workshops, community screenings, and grassroots advocacy." Building a network of similar artists by the '90s, in response to Bush Sr.'s Desert Storm, Paper Tiger gave voice to artists, intellectuals, and activists worldwide to critique the war in the homes of millions. They attempt to give voice to people so that they too can be the media, and to raise awareness about the current state of video communication. Perpetual Pirate Radio Pirate radio is a reimagination of radio possibilities through nonviolent direct action. Berkeley Liberation Radio and Free Radio Santa Cruz are two local guerilla media brigades, broadcasting at very high wattages for 11 and 15 years, respectively, 24 hours a day, in defiance of federal regulations. Both stations intend to be an accessible source for people in the community to have a voice, and an alternative news source, broadcasting commercial free "to protest corporate control of the airwaves, to bring local control and local accountability to our community media, and to produce and broadcast a diversity of programs that are simply unavailable on corporate controlled stations." Indymedia Indymedia (a.k.a The Independent Media Center or IMC) is a democratic media network reporting on political and social issues all over the world. They began as a vehicle for non-corporate, grassroots news during the anti-WTO protests of 1999 in Seattle. Using an open publishing process, each autonomous indymedia allows anyone to contribute to their print, radio, video, and internet publications. They tend to provide up to the minute coverage on protests and demonstrations, as well as other events that other journalists disregard. Our local IMC collective, Indybay, for example, provided live updates on the prison sentencing of Johannes Mehserle and its aftermath in Oakland. Through a decentralized network present on every content, volunteers use existing structures of media to undermine the status quo. Peer-to-peer (p2p) networking Peer-to-peer is a distribution and sharing technique based on voluntary association and mutual aid . Essentially, participants make their file and media resources available to peers for free without a central network or server. This decentralized method became popular in the late 90s with Napster and other such file-sharing structures. Its very existence inherently challenges intellectual property and copyright ordinances. Peer-to-peer communication networks (such as Freenet and Entropy Network To Reduce Orwellian Potency Yield) allow anonymous users unrestrained free speech over the internet, and serve as a vehicle for whisteblowers. External Links Donna Haraway Reads the National Geographic - Paper Tiger Television SF Gate article on Neighborhood Public News